


The Incorruptible

by cristianoronaldo



Category: Football RPF, Sports RPF
Genre: AU, Character study (sort of), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-19
Updated: 2014-03-19
Packaged: 2018-01-16 07:01:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1336360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cristianoronaldo/pseuds/cristianoronaldo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>college au. the plot is pretty much irrelevant. <br/>They meet at a bonfire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Incorruptible

**Author's Note:**

> this hardly even has a plot and it's really dumb, but here you go it's basically a character study of both of them ?? 
> 
> let me know what you think happens at the end and how you think they break up/end things, etc., because i have something in mind and i want to see if you have a different interpretation or not okay thank you!!!

There were moments of divine happiness that splintered the long beams of despair that stretched from one year of his life to the next. The night of the bonfire started everything, and with the fire that sparked them into being came a monster, strong and capable of fearsome destruction. That monster called Desire threatened to burst their makeshift seams, so intent on making an impact that it paid no heed to the damage it was causing.

Cesc was sitting on the ground with his hands tucked into his pockets. His lips were parted. Sweat gathered like a blanket across his forehead, but he didn't reach to wipe it away; he liked that feeling, because with the heat came the freedom. Anything could happen when the sun burned through his skin and the air smelled like chlorine from the day's activities.

That time of night was the best, when it was still hot enough to lounge in the grass in shorts and a t-shirt, and the mosquitoes were buzzing around like eager party guests. That night, the sky was striped like a tiger's skin dipped in fresh water. It was an easy pastel blue, bleeding into fruit orange, blood orange, liquid lemon and, right above him, a lazy trail of white left behind by the early evening ghosts.

By late evening, the mosquitoes were the drunk, rowdy party guests. Cesc grew disenchanted with their presence as they cruelly tested their teeth on his smooth skin.  

When the citrus streaks had disappeared from the sky, and the blue let the darkness take over, and the bonfire was the only burning light of the night, Cesc looked up and saw a pair of dark eyes.

They were drinking in every aspect of the scene as Cesc's were, but there was a thinly veiled curiosity there that served to distance him from his friends. They clutched the necks of their bottles, like crutches, but when this man mouthed at his, his lips parted and his tongue stretched out to catch a drop; his eyes remained on the flames. He wasn’t drinking to consume himself.

Later when the fire was hotter and the night grew colder, and couples huddled together under blankets, Cesc introduced himself because, when he recognized a spark in a stranger, he forced himself to tease the stray light into glorious existence.

"I'm Cesc," he said simply.

"Iker," said the other man, and he had this voice, see. Cesc wasn’t swept off his feet, but every time the other man talked, he felt a smile pulling at his traitorous lips.

"Are you enjoying yourself?" He immediately regretted the words. He sounded too much like a host, eager to see how his party was shaping up.

"I am," Iker said decisively, and Cesc got the impression that he was there for a different reason than the rest of them. Iker had this way of talking, even back then. His voice was filled with meaning and power, and when it was quiet beneath the wind and struggling to be heard over the crackling fire, it seemed to transcend everything like a higher power shot him straight out of heaven just to be there. He spoke with such meaning, every word intense and exact. He uttered every syllable like he was thrusting his entire being into it, like this god had shaped his lips purely to release those words. Something lived and died on his lips that captivated Cesc with an intensity that made it difficult to breathe.

Iker’s eyes reflected the fire, so Cesc watched it there for a moment before turning to the real flames. He rubbed his hands together, forcing himself to examine every line on his palm. Just when he thought he’d made a mistake in coming over-- just when he thought he would have to lie in bed at night and toss and turn, despising himself-- Iker smiled like Cesc had said something funny.

“I’m graduating at the end of this year,” he said suddenly, like it had just dawned on him. “I’ll miss events like these.”

Cesc didn’t know what to say. He was overwhelmed by a desire to stare at Iker, to memorize every shade of darkness in his eyes, the curves of his mouth, the smile lines like trails Cesc’s fingers longed to travel. But that wasn’t socially acceptable-- to stare at people for long periods of time for no particular reason-- so he forced that feeling to crouch at the back of his throat like a hidden soldier waiting for a surprise attack.

“Oh,” Cesc said, and he was proud of himself for even getting that out. “But I’m sure you’ll go to stuff like this anyway.”

“You’re right,” he said, stuffing his hands in his pockets. He took a step closer to the fire. “I have no idea what I’m doing, so I might as well keep doing things that make me happy, right?”

With anyone else, the words would have carried too much weight for a normal conversation, but Iker had this way of speaking. When he opened his mouth, the words flowed easily. He did this in a simple way without sacrificing the meaning packed into every word. He was deliberate, not tense.

It was the first time Cesc ever fell deeply, passionately, and violently in love, but not the last. Stumbling madly, groping around blindly, somehow he fell into Iker’s arms one night, long after the bonfire and long after the coffee shops and the walks in the rain, and the things that weren’t so perfect too, like the time Cesc slipped in a puddle right in front of Iker, and the two of them laughed about it, but Cesc’s elbow was bruised and he was horribly embarrassed for weeks afterward. Months upon months stacked up with long strings of passion that were choking them, pulling them together-- but choking them.

Cesc often felt as though there was no escape for him. That, when Iker smiled, he was being pulled along like he was attached to the back of a sled led by the fierce winter dogs. Only he wasn’t standing and throwing his head back to feel the biting cold. He was cowering, stretched out on his stomach and feeling the burn, hands bloodied, voice hoarse from screaming for it all to end.

And Iker was standing calmly at the end of a long tunnel. No desperation, just standing with his palms open and the fire reflecting in his eyes, because that first night would never die. No matter how many seasons passed, or how many leaves fell, or how many apples fell from the thick branches and rotted in the grass alone and untouched-- no matter the time that passed, Cesc would remember that feeling and remember that light.

For a year, it was golden. For Cesc, winter had always been the most incredible time of his life. Once every year, the world around him died, and he was born anew. The trees were stripped of their color and the benches were stripped of their warmth. The snow fell and covered the tracks, covered the history of human sin. And there he was, at the center of it all, staring up at the sky and pushing the hood back, letting the snow fall on his face. Opening his mouth and catching the ice the heavens offered.

And, sometimes, there was Iker beside him, bundled up in his oversized coat and grumbling mildly about the cold. He messed with Cesc’s coat, buttoning it for him because Cesc always pulled it open.

“You’re going to catch a cold this way,” he’d say, struggling with the buttons and, still, refusing to remove his thick red mittens. Finally, “do it yourself,” he’d say, and he wouldn’t move from his spot until Cesc fastened the coat with an irritated expression. His annoyance vanished immediately afterward though, so Iker never stopped telling him to keep warm, and Cesc never stopped listening.

As enchanting as the winter had always seemed, it was that very first summer that proved to be the most unforgettable. Cesc always thought his experiences with Iker were on a scale of most unforgettable to least unforgettable, and he knew that he could never lose what Iker meant to him, and what they shared, but he stockpiled the most incorruptible memories. He kept them in the back of his mind somewhere, filed away for the day when he needed to touch up the picture.  

Much later, after Iker, Cesc would touch his wrist or his cheek, or the back of his neck, and he would flash back to one of his most unforgettables, and he would have to shut his eyes for a moment and remember. The colors, the sound of Iker’s voice, the rough feel of his jeans as they slid against Cesc’s hands in the dark-- it all returned, more beautiful and broken and vivid than ever.

Artists touch up masterpieces after time has eaten some of the beauty away; Cesc touched up his memories. After time had broken their bond and separated them too far for anything to touch, Cesc brushed his mind over each and every memory, lovingly and longingly. Tremendously sorry, he brought them back to life. And with every breath he drew that wasn’t simply an inhalation of past dust and past mistakes, he killed them once more.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> i want to start actually tweeting about where i am concerning writing, so if you'd like to participate in that-- here goes my shameless self-promotion-- @sanikersaves 
> 
> (also animo jese)


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